Each year, college gets more expensive. Tuition and other costs have continued to escalate, reports show, prompting ever-higher levels of governmental and institutional financial support.
Some colleges in Rhode Island have responded by trying to raise more money internally for student financial aid, though the challenges of paying for a college education remain daunting.
From 1985 to 2011, the average tuition nationwide grew by nearly 500 percent – or more than four times the rate of inflation as measured by the consumer price index, Forbes magazine reported. And tuitions have continued to creep higher since 2011, according to other reports.
Some observers blame ever-rising tuitions on the explosive growth of college administration and management in recent years: Between 1993 and 2009, administrative positions at colleges and universities grew by 60 percent – 10 times faster than the rate of growth of tenured faculty positions, according to U.S. Department of Education data.
Others argue that colleges are spending too much on facilities and various amenities.
“Schools are competing with amenities,” said Thomas Toch, director of FutureEd, a Washington, D.C., think tank on educational issues. “The question becomes: How much is enough?
“It’s becoming increasingly difficult for middle-class families” to send their children to college, Toch added.
Whatever the causes, students at Rhode Island colleges and universities are saddled with some of the highest costs for tuition and fees in the nation, statistics show.
Tuition and fees at private Rhode Island colleges and universities average $35,631 a year. That’s the third-highest in the nation behind only Vermont and Massachusetts, according to collegetuitioncompare.com, a website that tracks tuition and other college expenses.
That figure doesn’t include room and board, which is an additional $15,732 a year for students here living on campus and an additional $12,394 a year for those living off campus.
‘Schools are competing with amenities. The question becomes: How much is enough?’
THOMAS TOCH, FutureEd director
Rhode Island also ranks near the top of the nation in costs for its public colleges and universities. Tuition and fees for those schools average $9,044 a year for in-state students (sixth-highest in the nation), and $21,162 a year for out-of-state students (second-highest in the nation), according to the website.
Brown University in Providence responded this year to rising student costs with the “Brown Promise,” the latest of several initiatives in recent years to help students of all income levels pay for their education.
Brown Promise is a fundraising program to eliminate loans from the university’s financial aid packages for all undergraduate students and replace the loans with scholarship funds that don’t have to be repaid.
Overall, 57 percent of Brown’s undergraduates receive no financial aid from the university because they have no demonstrated need, said Brown spokesman Brian Clark.
The other 43 percent receive financial aid from the university that averages $50,846 per student each school year, he said.
And students could use every dollar of it. Brown, which consistently ranks among the nation’s top academic institutions, is the most expensive school in Rhode Island, according to data from collegetuitioncompare.com.
Tuition and fees at Brown for the current school year come to $55,556, plus $14,670 for room and board, the website found.
Providence College ranked second in Rhode Island with tuition and fees of $50,528 (plus $17,555 for room and board), followed by Rhode Island School of Design, also in Providence, with tuition and fees of $50,409 (plus $13,572 for room and board).
Brown started raising money for its Promise program a year ago and put it into effect starting this semester. Currently, the school has 1,452 undergraduates receiving financial assistance under the program.
As of December, Brown had raised $30 million for Promise from more than 2,000 alumni and other donors. The goal is to raise $120 million to fully fund the initiative. Clark said Brown “continues to make progress toward that goal.”
In 2008, Brown eliminated parent contributions for students from families with annual incomes below $60,000 and replaced loans with scholarship funds for students from families with annual incomes under $100,000.
At the University of Rhode Island in South Kingstown, tuition and fees for the current school year come to $14,344 for in-state students and $31,244 for out-of-state students. In addition, room and board comes to $12,950 a year, according to figures from collegetuitioncompare.com.
Meanwhile, URI has raised the amount it provides for student scholarships and grants to about $100 million a year, up from about $60 million a year several years ago, said Dean Libutti, the university’s vice provost for enrollment management.
“It’s part of our operating budget,” Libutti said about financial aid. “A lot of it comes from our foundation, which is supported by alumni.”
Recognizing the need to do more for students at Rhode Island’s public colleges, Gov. Gina M. Raimondo last year announced the “Rhode Island Promise” program. Last fall, the state launched the $2.8 million pilot program to help recent high school graduates in Rhode Island complete their education at Community College of Rhode Island without paying tuition and fees.
Raimondo recently said that, if re-elected in November, she will revive her proposal to expand the state program and give Rhode Island residents two years of free tuition at the University of Rhode Island and at Rhode Island College in Providence.
“If we don’t continue to expand our successful Promise scholarship and Real Jobs RI partnerships,” the governor said, “thousands of Rhode Islanders will never get the job training and education they need to keep up and get ahead.”
Scott Blake is a PBN staff writer. Email him at Blake@PBN.com.
![2018 average tuition and fees for
New England colleges and universities
[prices do not include room and board] / Source: Collegetuitioncompare.com](https://assets.pbn.com/uploads/2018/09/0914tuitionchart-1.jpg "2018 average tuition and fees for
New England colleges and universities
[prices do not include room and board] / Source: Collegetuitioncompare.com")
